


Broken Promises

by alidiabin



Category: Borgen (TV)
Genre: Birgittes father, Father/Daughter, Gen, post S1, pre S2
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-27
Updated: 2013-12-27
Packaged: 2018-01-06 08:18:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 525
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1104554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alidiabin/pseuds/alidiabin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Birgitte rings her father to tell him about the promise she broke. Post S1, pre S2. Mentions of 1x06</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken Promises

The Castle, like New York City, never slept. It was in the dark, that deals were brokered, personal liaisons had and alliances forged. It was in the dark, that Birgitte sat the only light coming from the telephone, as she waited for her father to pick-up the telephone.

The phone rang twice; Birgitte was not surprised, as her father had never liked the intrusiveness of the phone, especially in the evenings. She imagined him, sitting by the fire, classical opera playing, with foreign poetry in his hands, and a bottle of vintage red wine on the table. The cordless phone, an ill-thought present from Phillip, the Christmas before they were married, was probably behind a sofa cushion or behind a pile of books, if it was even charged.

“Birgitte,” her father’s uttered, as he caught his breath, and turned down the music.  She imagined he’d turned the lounge inside-out trying to find it, only to silence the thing, disturbing his quiet evening.

Birgitte remained silent, as she suddenly questioned why she had even bothered to call him. He would have found out, like the entire country, including her own mother, when it made the papers. She could already picture the Ekpress front page, her family portrait ripped in half, with an outrageous headline, about how her wrecked marriage meant she was incapable of running the country.

“Birgitte,” her father repeated, taking a quick sip of wine, “The phone your husband gave me has caller ID,”

“Dad,” she whispered, the sadness slipping into her voice.

“Is something the matter?” her father asked.

Her eyes fell on the photographs of her children, her beautiful happy children.  She and Phillip had not yet agreed on when to tell them, they had agreed to tell them together, but Birgitte was finding every excuse not to, in the vain hope that Phillip would change his mind. That hope had almost disappeared, when she found him circling ‘to rent’ advertisements, while they had a family breakfast in almost complete silence.

“I could not keep that promise,” she whispered, as she remembered his most recent visit. She remembered the regret in his voice as he talked about the divorce. She remembered the promise she had made with such conviction, so sure that she could keep it.

Her father gulped, taking a long sip of wine, making Birgitte wish she had taken the bottle of vodka she knew Kasper kept at his desk. She felt tears sting her eyes, as she tried to calculate her father’s disappointment, by the amount of time he remained silent. The last time he had been this silent, was when she had announced she was marrying the man, he had declared a materialistic heathen.

 “Oh, Birgitte,” he sighed. He sounded upset, not disappointed as she expected.

A lone tear slipped down her face, as the reality of it all came crashing down. Before, either of them could say anything tears were streaming down her face. She cried. Her father stayed on the line, until her nose was red-raw, her voice hoarse, and until the tears stopped.

The sun rose over the castle, and the nights secrets were buried. 

**Author's Note:**

> I don't speak Danish, and really struggled with getting the speech patterns right so apologies.


End file.
